Month: August 2011

Jones Street Station – The Understanding Check out Brooklyn-based Jones Street Station, another fantastic sounding bluegrass band from the New York scene. A simple, country, folk, bluegrass band that can harmonize like nobody’s business. The band recently collaborated with actor Danny Pudi (Abed on NBC’s Community) and filmmaker Adam Reid (Hello Lonesome) to create a music video for their song “The Understanding,” the single for Jones Street Stations forthcoming third LP. “The Understanding” is a gentle, and graceful song about finding friends in a huge place like the open world of New York. Its a great sentiment and a catchy…

In support of their upcoming album, American Goldwing, Portland’s Blitzen Trapper released a video for single “Love the Way You Walk Away.” I’m always particularly excited to hear new material from these guys; I’ve been a huge fan for a long while, I’ve seen them multiple times live and they always bring the goods. This album is starting to show its colors, its a 70’s folk rock influenced album; and on this track Earley’s voice on the chorus really grabs you. Its a great sounding track, and one that I’ll be going back to again and again.

Providence, RI duo Brown Bird recently announced the the release of their newest full length album, Salt for Salt, being released October 18th, 2011 on Supply & Demand Music. Their sunday early show at Newport Folk Festival this year opened a lot of ears to one absolutely fantastic, dark, moody folk band that is going to make some waves with their upcoming album. Brown Bird released their second single from the album “Thunder and Lightning,” which was premiered via Paste Magazine. I got my first taste of this very talented duo at the Newport Folk Fest lineup announcement, they played live, and I was totally blown away, instantly became a fan. They’ve got a dark, circus vibe, the deviant side of folk music, thats playful, sly, and mischievous. A definite must listen check out Thunder and Lightning, grab a preorder Salt for Salt, and catch a show (dates below).

Check out Dublin’s James Vincent McMorrow, one of the best crooners around performing at “This Old Dark Machine,” “Sparrow And The Wolf,” “Follow You Down To The Red Oak Tree,” & “Red Dust” at NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert.

Yesterday San Fran’s The Dodos debuted their new video for their track ‘Good’ off of their recent album No Color which was out back in March. It’s a fantastic album that is well worth having in your collection for this year. As well as the video they also released a free live recording of a show they had in Amsterdam, which I spent the better part of the day listening to. So check out the video, download the free live recording, and grab yourself a copy of No Color

Vancouver based singer songwriter Dan Mangan is set to release his new album Oh Fortune, as well as a US tour in support of the album. Mangan’s sound is that of sincerity, and on this album a sense of increased maturity. The current offering is his title track “Oh Fortune,” which shines with his gravelly voice and some understated musical arrangements that grow in complexity as the song goes on. Its beautiful, emotionally driven, and if its any indication of the whole album, I think it will be a great success.

Oh Fortune (released 9/27 on Arts & Crafts) is available for Pre-Order along with a download of the title track from the album on Dan Mangan’s website here.

Check out video for Brooklyn / Boston band, The Highway’s “Set Me Free.”An energetic, indie rock that has some really catchy hooks. The video is a total trip, with a 60s style & black and white illusion graphics goes well with their guitar driven throwback rock sound that reminds me of Sweden’s garage rock band The Hives. Set Me Free” is available on the band’s album Forest People on iTunes. Check out more from the band: Web | Facebook | Twitter | Bandcamp

Photo by Ricky Chapman Active Child – Playing House It’s been just one year since Active Child’s acclaimed EP launched his name. The moniker of Pat Grossi, Active Child’s first full-length album You Are All I See is out today and it’s everything and nothing that you’d expect. As I was first listening to the album, I read a lot of tweets from others that all said the same thing: I thought I was going to hate this album, but I kind of love it. Which is a bit of what I was expecting as well. It’s different, fascinating, entrancing…

Cass McCombs – The Same Thing Cass McCombs is yet again releasing another album, Humor Risk, which was recorded in various homes and studios in California, New York, New Jersey and Chicago, and was produced by Cass and Ariel Rechtshaid, with whom he created Wit’s End, and Catacombs. His first cut is the rhythmic slow burner “The Same Thing.” As usual for Cass’ music, I think it takes a while to sort of get into it, but “The Same Thing,” is another lonesome, folk number that goes along quite well with McCombs northern California cool breezy style, its a bit whimsical, and a tad drowsy, but good for…

SSLYBY – Yellow Missing Signs Rolling Stone featured SSLYBY (I’m not typing it again!) today for their unreleased track Yellow Missing Signs, a track that will actually be released on a huge compilation entitled Tape Club. Tape Club is is a compilation of a huge backlog(about 100 tracks) of material written and recorded by the aforementioned band, boiled down to 26, and released on Polyvinyl records. The first released track is “Yellow Missing Signs,” a bouncy synthpop song about an unsolved missing persons crime in Missouri. Check it out, and pre-order Tape Club here.